What is Cura Personalis, really?

[j_diggity]

I'm writing my secondary for SLU and I can't find any mention about what Cura Personalis *really* is or how it's reflected in their curriculum or values, other than the brief statement that Cura Personalis is "care for the individual person." From my read, it sounds like this is essentially the same as regular healthcare, but with an additional focus on the spiritual dimension. Without going into too much detail, I'm Catholic and somewhat religious and have always looked up to the Jesuits, so I appreciate this, but it's really unclear as to what Cura Personalis actually looks like in practice. This is as detailed as it gets on their website:

We embody cura personalis (“care for the individual person”). Our work at the Saint Louis University School of Medicine goes beyond training physicians to be scholars of the human body. We graduate doctors who appreciate humanistic medicine, concern themselves with the sanctity of human life and commit to dignity and respect for all patients.

Is anybody else struggling with this? Does anyone have any concrete information on what Cura Personalis is at Jesuit schools and how it is reflected in their curriculum, or what might be some ways to address this in our "why us" essays?

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[txpremed1234]

georgetown has some really nice articles on it if you want to look more in depth! basically it's a holistic approach as you said

 

[gyngyn]

You can get some ideas here:

Biopsychosocial model - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[cj_cregg]

As someone educated in the Jesuit tradition, I was always taught that cura personalis is care for the WHOLE person, not individual person? Maybe I'm remembering wrong. Basically holistic care that encompasses not just physical health but also social, psychological, and spiritual dimensions. Being attentive to things like whether patients have cultural or religious beliefs that affect their care, social determinants of health, considering the relationship between medical conditions and mental health, appreciating the patient as a human being and not just a patient, etc.